


Waves

by cgf_kat



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt Lance (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, Lance (Voltron) is a Mess, Lance (Voltron)-centric, Lion Bonds, Post Season 6, Protective Team, Team, Team Feels, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-14
Updated: 2018-07-14
Packaged: 2019-06-10 12:36:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15291666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cgf_kat/pseuds/cgf_kat
Summary: In which there is much Lance whump and H/C and team feels, and people caring about Lance post S6, in a situation caused by an unruly plant. (Finally getting this posted here; it's been on tumblr for a few weeks.)“Hey…Coran?”“Hmm?”“Could you scan me again?”The older man’s eyebrows go up almost immediately. “Are you all right, my boy?”Does Coran see something? Is he making a face? Quiznak, he’s making a face, isn’t he?“I um…” A sudden wave of pain makes him hiss. Yeah, this is definitely not good. “Nope. Not all right. Definitely not.” Lance is hunched over now, and he doesn’t really remember doing it. A new wave of burning, sharper than before, stabbing at his insides like knives, and he gasps. “Coran, something’s wrong…!”





	Waves

“Coran, do you really have to scan me every five tics?” Lance asks irritably.

“Oh come now, at most I’ve been scanning you every ten or fifteen doboshes!”

“Which is more than enough,” he sighs. Red rumbles in the back of his mind as if to echo his frustration, and he smiles a little even though his head is pounding. 

Of course they’ve only been without the castle and the healing pods and the infirmary’s more detailed scanner for less than two days, and he’s already gotten himself into trouble. The first new planet they camped on last night - a lush forest world rather than the barren rock they’d landed on after the battle - and he had to go and get himself attacked by a plant. 

A PLANT.

Lance rubs absently at the bandages around his neck. He stayed in his civilian clothes to allow for the bandages, and they still dip under the edge of his shirt. That crazy plant really did attack him though. Practically jumped out of the shadows and shot a barrage of thorns at him - most of which caught him right in the neck, because of course they did. 

Well. At least one of them attacking him made the others aware of which types of planets to avoid for the rest of the night. That was something. There’d been a lot of them, and anyone could have gotten hurt if they hadn’t known. 

Coran tut-tuts, and continues his scanning - waving the portable medical scanner around Lance’s head and down over his body even as he flies. The thing kind of reminds Lance of a tricorder from Star Trek...he’d be lying if he said he’d never watched that show a kid. Not that Coran would have any idea what he was talking about if he said something. 

“You know we need to keep a close eye on you; the portable scanners are all we have right now, and they cannot pick up on as much. I have to keep apprised of your condition.”

“Can’t I just let you know if I feel weird?”

“DO you feel ‘weird’?”

Lance lets out another longsuffering breath. “Well, yeah, but you know that...”

“And THAT is why I’m scanning you. Any new developments?”

“Not really. Just...the headache and the, I guess it’s a fever. I still feel hot.” It’s getting worse, if he’s honest. He can feel the sweat pricking at his hairline. 

“We’ll keep an eye on it.” Coran hesitates. “We could always set back down somewhere to wait this out.”

“No, it’s fine. I’m fine,” Lance says quickly. “Pidge has a whole course planned for today, and she knows where she wants us to stop; I don’t want to mess up her flight plan.”

Besides, if he can’t fly through what basically amounts to a bad common cold, what good is he as a pilot?

Coran grumbles a bit as he sits back down in the back of the cockpit to analyze his scans more closely. “If only the plants hadn’t been too violent to make taking samples a viable option…”

Keith and Shiro had been hesitant to let the group take off this morning, because Coran wasn’t sure what the seemingly mild toxins the thorns had been carrying would do. 

“He isn’t having any significant reactions now, but there are larger spore-like particles that have been released into his bloodstream, and I don’t like the look of them. They could be harmless, but not having a way to extract them makes me a bit bothered,” Coran had said. He also insisted on riding with Lance today if they did take off.

“Maybe I should too,” Keith had suggested. “If something happens, I should be able to fly Red. Shiro can take Black.”

“Keith, I’m fine, and you know Red - it’s not like she’s going to let us crash or anything even if something does happen. Besides, Shiro probably shouldn’t be flying again yet anyway - no offense, man.”

Shiro just shrugged. “None taken.” He’d seemed...all right enough, since he woke up. But he still just looked so tired all the time Lance didn’t want him to have to worry about flying.

So here he is, him and Coran, and Kaltenecker down in the hold, halfway through a day of flying, and whatever those thorns did to him is definitely getting worse. Great.

“I mean…” Lance says. “If the poison was gonna do anything crazy it would have by now, right? This should be it, huh? Just the...general ickiness?”

Coran blinks up at him when he glances back. “Well I would certainly hope so.”

What happens next starts out feeling like heartburn. Nothing serious. Lance chalks it up to the general ickiness and leaves it at that. No reason to worry Coran with it. He doesn’t even start to worry himself until it spreads - the burning sensation radiating from his chest and out through his veins. It still isn’t...bad. Exactly. But…

“Hey…Coran?”

“Hmm?”

“Could you scan me again?”

The older man’s eyebrows go up almost immediately. “Are you all right, my boy?”

Does Coran see something? Is he making a face? Quiznak, he’s making a face, isn’t he?

“I um…” A sudden wave of pain makes him hiss. Yeah, this is definitely not good. “Nope. Not all right. Definitely not.” Lance is hunched over now, and he doesn’t really remember doing it. A new wave of burning, sharper than before, stabbing at his insides like knives, and he gasps. “Coran, something’s wrong…!”

Coran is already there, a steadying hand on his shoulder keeping him from toppling out of his seat. Lance releases the controls before he can run into someone, and he feels the subtle shift as Red takes over. He hears the yowl of concern in the back of his mind from the lion. 

“Hang on,” Coran says, trying to get a scan. “Hang on, now…”

Lance tries to answer, but the waves keep lapping against him, battering him into a gasping ball in his seat. 

“What’s going on!” he manages finally. “Wh-what—!”

“Some of the spores made their way to your heart, and dissolved; it seems to have released a much larger dose of the plant’s toxin into your bloodstream, and where they did it has provided a quick and easy way for it to spread.”

“Am I dying??” How can Coran sound so calm? He doesn’t look happy, but how can he SOUND so calm? 

The hand on his shoulder squeezes. “No no! It isn’t fatal, it just—”

“Can you...can you do something?” A stronger wave. How can they be getting stronger? He shouts this time, because he can’t help it, and oh quiznak, it hurts. It hurts so much. 

The hand is gone. Coran is fumbling through the medical supplies he has at the back of the cockpit. “I can try! No guarantees…” Is he cursing back there under under his breath? He’s definitely cursing. A lot. Lance tries to laugh - to focus on that rather than the burning and pain. 

It only works a little, but a little is better than nothing, right?

Coran comes back with a hypo injection and presses it quickly into Lance’s neck. “There! That’s the strongest thing we have; should knock you right on your wimble.”

For a moment, he thinks maybe it worked. There’s something of a break in the onslaught. For a moment, he can breathe more easily. 

Then it all starts again, and he thinks it’s worse. “Coran!” 

His body folds over the armrest of his seat as he shouts, and Lance isn’t really sure why. But Coran is there. There are arms around him and a shoulder under his bent forehead and a voice in his ear to focus on. When he can think again Lance realizes the voice is apologizing, over and over and over.

He tries, clumsily, to return the embrace when he can think enough to do it. “Not...not your fault…”

There are more voices now - hails coming in from the other lions. Red stopped. Lance can sense it now. They’ve come to a stop and the others have backtracked to them, are shouting through the comms asking what’s wrong. 

Lance leans back into his seat with a groan, but Coran keeps one arm around his shoulders as he reaches to open their own audio channel. “I’m afraid the effects of the thorns are turning out to be more serious than I expected. We should find somewhere to land.”   


“Is Lance all right?” An urgent, demanding voice. 

Lance can’t help smiling tiredly even though they can’t see him. “I’m here, Pidge.”

“Yeah but  _ are you okay _ ?” Hunk asks.

“I’ll live…? I think?”

Keith cuts in to say they can talk and figure out what to do once they’ve landed, and one by one the extra channels disconnect while Pidge plots a course for the nearest planet. The black lion’s signal is the only one that doesn’t flicker away, and when the others are gone a video feed pops open. 

“Coran, is he in any danger?” Keith asks immediately. Maybe he didn’t want to ask that in front of the rest of the team, in case the answer wasn’t good. It’s strange to admit, Lance thinks faintly, but Keith really is a much better leader now. He’s different than he was before he left. 

That doesn’t mean he isn’t going to tease him anyway. Lance tries to straighten up, but it’s difficult. A bone-deep fatigue has settled over his body. “Gee, Keith, I’m right here you know,” he smirks.

“I don’t believe so,” Coran answers.

Shiro leans in over Keith’s shoulder. “What happened? The red lion…”

“When she stopped I could feel her worrying about you,” Keith says. 

“And I could feel it through my connection with Black,” Shiro fills in. “It was that strong.”

Lance winces. “It just...hurt. That’s all.” He’d really rather not be the cause of that look on their faces right now, but there isn’t much he can do to change it.

“Coran, are you sure whatever’s going on isn’t causing any damage?” Shiro asks. 

“It isn’t. I’m sure of that, at least. As soon as it’s all worked its’ way out of his system he should be fine. But...I am afraid it may get worse before it gets better.”

“Again,” Lance sighs. “RIGHT here.”

Coran squeezes his shoulders again, because he still hasn’t really let go. And Lance is kind of okay with that right now. “I’m sorry, my boy. There are a good number of spores left in your bloodstream, and as they dissolve...well…” 

“Great,” Lance sighs. 

In fact, he can feel it starting again now. Nothing so drastic as the attack a few moments ago. Not yet, anyway. But the burning sensation is making itself known again, throbbing through his veins like an ache that never really went away entirely, now that he thinks about it.

By the time they set down on a small, sparsely-vegetated moon with just enough atmosphere, the constant throb is worse. Impossible to ignore. Like having the stomach flu as a kid but like, five times worse. And everything hurts. 

At least he didn’t have to fly to get there; he asked Red to fall in with the others and she did, so he could try to get up out of his seat. He tried to pace, or something, to distract himself, but he couldn’t go long before he dropped back into his seat, exhausted and breathing hard because that’s the only thing that helps otherwise. That and digging his fingers into the armrests.

Warm. His back is warm. It takes a moment to focus on the rhythmic motion there - Coran, rubbing his back in steady circles as Red lands. 

And the others will be here soon. That’s nice. 

He hears the pounding on the ramp - hears it pause, and faint impressions of Keith and Shiro’s voices before the stampede picks up again. A moo from the hold and the cockpit door opening. Then Coran’s steadying hand is gone to be replaced by Hunk’s arms around him and Pidge is kneeling by his seat with her arms latched around his waist. 

“Shiro and Keith explained what’s going on,” Pidge says, her voice muffled in the chest of his jacket. 

“Man, this sucks…” Hunk offers.

Lance tries to laugh. He isn’t sure how well it comes out. “Do I look that bad?” Pidge pulls back just enough to raise an eyebrow at him. 

“Like hell warmed over, dude,” Hunk confirms. 

He’d love to retort, but he’s robbed of the chance when a vice grip of pain closes around him again - taking the duller, constant throb and ratcheting it up to fourteen. He really hates how much it seems to freak them out when he cries out and doubles over, but yeah…

Maybe make that sixteen or seventeen?

Great. His pain level is older than Pidge. 

Everything goes fuzzy. Lance is vaguely aware of moving, off being pulled to his feet and something just picking him up when he can’t stay standing even with help. He can hear them worrying. He can hear them calling urgently to each other, to him, but he doesn’t know what they’re saying. His fingers twist in what he’s pretty sure is Hunk’s vest, but he can’t stop screaming long enough to try to listen to any of them.

Screaming. It’s definitely screaming this time, isn’t it? Maybe he really is dying. He wouldn’t blame Coran for not knowing it would be that bad, but he’d really rather not die like this. 

When it all tapers off at least enough for him to pry his eyes open, Hunk is still holding him - and so is Pidge, really - but they’re all in the middle of the giant pile of pillows and blankets from the castle that ended up in Red’s cargo hold, and the others are crowded around them anxiously. 

Lance almost can’t see them through the sweat dripping into his eyes. “Guy...s…”

They’re all there. Even Romelle and Keith’s mom. 

“We’re not going anywhere,” Allura says. Something squeezes his hand, and he realizes it’s her. “We will get you through this. I am sorry that it seems my alchemy isn’t able to extract the poison.”   


“You tried...?” he rasps. Was he really so out of it he didn’t even notice? She looks so upset; why does she have to be so upset? 

“It did not work; I am sorry.”

“-t’s okay…” She’s saved his life once already with those powers. She’s done more than enough for him.

“Is there  _ anything _ we can do, Coran?” Hunk asks. “Space morphine or something? Anything?”

Coran crosses his arms and shakes his head in frustration. “I don’t know what morphine is, but I’m afraid not. We tried the anti-toxin back on the planet, and I’ve just tried the strongest painkiller we have on hand. Not only did it not work - the toxin seems to have burned it off almost  immediately - but it may or not have contributed to making the situation worse briefly. Even if we had any other medication to try, I don’t know that we could risk giving it to him.”

Lance holds up a finger. “Right here, Coran.”

Keith crouches down so he can lean closer, and man if this new somewhat-more-in-touch Keith isn’t still weird…

“How are you doing?” he asks. 

“Not...awesome,” Lance admits. 

The pain hasn’t stopped; it’s just faded to manageable levels again for the moment, though there are still really goofy sounds slipping out between breaths. He’s too tired to focus enough to try to stop it right now. The others don’t care anyway; he knows that. It’s just what’s left of his pride that sort-of cares. 

“How much more of that stuff is left in his system?” Shiro asks.

Coran checks his scanner, running it over Lance again. He scowls at it. “A good bit...could be looking at a few vargas more.”

Lance rolls his face into Hunk’s shoulder and groans loudly. “Come on, really?”

Pidge’s grip around one of his arms tightens. “But...we can’t just leave him like this.”

It’s getting worse again. AGAIN. Already. Lance’s heart pounds faster in his chest just from the fear of it. He really hopes that doesn’t show on his face, but since when has he ever been good at hiding anything?

But at least they’re all there with him. That’s something. It’s better than...than the way things have been going recently. Or has all of that been in his head? It probably doesn’t matter now either way. 

They’re here now. When he screams again he holds onto more of the details. He needs those details. Hunk holding him against his shoulder and Pidge with an arm around him, too. Allura is holding one of his hands and Coran has the other. He’s pretty sure that extra hand on his knee is Keith.

Someone is crying. Quiznak, that’s him. His chest is heaving and everything is just pain, but at least he isn’t alone. 

“-ance! Lance, look at me!”

A hand on his face. A big one? 

“Lance, come on!”

Shiro? It’s so hard to get his eyes open when all he wants to do is squeeze them shut and scream, because at least screaming is doing something. But Shiro won’t leave him alone.

“I need you to focus, Lance. Reach out to your lion. I think she can help you.”

What…? His lips form the word but all that’s coming out is groaning. 

“Reach out to Red,” Shiro says urgently. “With your mind. Open up to her. She wants to help.”

How? How could Red help? How does Shiro know that?

But he can feel it, now, even though it’s hard to think at all. Red pushing at the back of his mind, worried and angry. 

“You can do it,” Shiro is saying. “Just focus on Red... ”

It’s like Red reaches out to meet him in the middle when he asks her for help. She scoops his mind up, and everything else starts to fade. The cargo hold, his friends…

When he opens his eyes again he’s somewhere else. It looks sort of like the void from inside Voltron, except he’s alone, and there are no columns of light. Just the emptiness.

Except it isn’t empty. Red is there, and there’s no pain. 

Lance cranes his neck to look up at the lion. “Please tell me I didn’t just die,” he mumbles.

A chuckle in his mind. No. He isn’t dead. His mind is simply being held here, with Red, safe and away from the toxin wreaking havoc on his body. 

“Oh…” He swallows, and he doesn’t know why his throat feels tight all of a sudden, or how that’s even possible here. “You did that for me…”

Shiro was right. She wanted to help. 

Red bows her head in what can only be something like a nod, and her glowing astral form shrinks until it’s a size more like a normal lion. The hard metal transforms into red fur, and the lions pads over to him and nuzzles at his hands. 

“Okay, okay, I get it,” Lance laughs. “You actually like me.”

Red huffs.

“You never hated me, I was just silly? What? I’m not  _ silly _ ! I just have a highly developed sense of humor!”

Another huff.

“Fine. We can agree to disagree on that one.” Lance sighs and sits cross-legged on the ground, because there really doesn’t seem to be much else to do here. At least it’s better than out there right now, though. The lion settles beside him, and he strokes Red’s fur absently. 

He’s not sure when he falls asleep, or whatever the astral equivalent is. But he loses time, and when he wakes up he finds himself still in whatever plane this is, curled into Red’s side. But there’s a hand on his shoulder. A face smiling at him.

“Shiro? How are you in here…?”

Shiro shrugs and sits down beside him. “I asked the black lion to bring me in here to check on you; wasn’t sure it would work, but here I am.”

“Oh…” Lance looks around again, taking in the strange starry sky that isn’t a sky, and the endless void around and beneath them. “Did you know Red pulling ME in here would work?”

Shiro winces. “No...I hoped. There was nothing else we could do for you; I had to try something. And Black could tell that Red wanted to help, so…"

Lance cocks his head curiously. “You can sense a lot more than you used to, even now that you’re not like...living in there anymore…”

“Kind of. Sometimes. It’s hard to explain,” he answers. His eyes go distant at that. 

“Are...Shiro are you okay? You just look so tired.”

Shiro smiles. “It’s an adjustment, Lance. I’m fine, I’m just getting used to this body...and the memories that came with it, honestly. It’s just taking a lot out of me right now - physically and mentally. But I’ll be all right; I just need some time.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“You promise?”

“Lance, I  _ promise _ ,” Shiro chuckles. 

“Good,” Lance huffs. Because if the way he had to come back or how  _ long  _ it took him to get back had caused any problems…

Shiro studies him for a moment. Lance looks away, studying the subtle patterns in Red’s fur between his fingers. 

“Lance, what is it?” Shiro asks gently.

Again, HOW is it even possible to get choked up in here? It’s not fair. 

“Nothing…”

“Don’t do that,” Shiro says. “You can talk to me. You can  _ always _ talk to me.”

But Shiro doesn’t push him, and Lance is grateful for the time he’s given to collect himself. He wants to answer, but…

“I...I should have been able to figure out what you were trying to tell me,” he says finally. “If I had, i-if we’d found you sooner, maybe half of the stuff that’s happened the last few days could have been avoided. Maybe—”

“Stop,” Shiro says quickly. “No, Lance. Don’t think that. You were trying to listen; it’s not your fault we got cut off. And...that was a lot to put on you, anyway. It was a lot to put on anyone.”

“The other you came to me...he tried to tell me he didn’t feel right, and...and I didn’t want to think it was anything serious. I didn’t—”

“I know. You didn’t do anything wrong, Lance. You still tried to help.”

Lance blinks at him. “How do you know…?”

Shiro hesitates. “I can remember it...sort of.” 

Oh. Right. He said that, a moment ago. The new body and the memories that came with it. 

Oh. 

“Listen, Lance...I know things weren’t always the best between you and the other me while I was gone….and I’m sorry for that.”

Lance swallows. “It’s not your fault…”

Shiro quirks half a smile. “I’m not sure that’s entirely true - he thought he was me. He had my memories - my personality. He just had even more to deal with. But anyway...please, just understand that there is no part of anything that’s happened that is your fault. Okay?”

A hand on his shoulder again, and Lance’s throat closes once more and all he can do is nod, but he leans closer and Shiro takes the hint. He shifts close enough to wrap his arm around Lance and pull him close. 

“Red will wake you up when it’s safe,” Shiro says after a while. “We’ll all be waiting.”

“How are things out there?” Lance asks.

“Your body is still reacting to some degree...it was worrying the others. That’s one reason I came in here; they uh...they wanted me to be able to tell them for sure you weren’t...feeling it.”

“Great…”

“Everyone out there loves you, Lance. You know that...right?”

Lance has to swallow a few more times. “I um...yeah. Yeah. And I um...yeah, I’m fine here.” He smirks. “Tell everybody I said ‘hi’ I guess.”

When he does wake, what he guesses is vargas later, the others are all still there. The pile of blankets and pillows is smaller because most of them are being used and nearly everyone is asleep, but they’re all here.

Lance tries to move, but decides that’s a bad plan when his muscles scream at him. Every single one of them is sore. His bloodstream itself feels sore. He just woke up but he has never felt more tired in his life. 

Pidge shifts when he does, and sleepy amber eyes blink up at him. “Hmm...Lance?”

“Yeah?” he answers quietly. 

“You m’kay?” she mumbles.

“I guess I will be…”

“‘Kay good.” She shifts to wrap her arms around his neck, and promptly falls asleep again against his chest. Lance can’t help laughing a little, even though it hurts his sore throat. 

Hunk is snoring at his back, Keith is asleep half draped over his sleeping wolf no more than three feet away, and Allura and Coran are sleeping propped against each other beside them. Blankets have been draped over everyone, pillows stuffed under heads where possible. Krolia and Romelle are awake on the other side of the cargo hold, seemingly fascinated with Kaltenecker. 

A familiar hand on his shoulder. Shiro, smiling down at him. “Welcome back.”

“Everybody’s asleep…”

“You mostly calmed down in the last varga or two. When the scans started to clear up and we knew you’d be all right everyone just kind of...dropped like flies.”

Lance chuckles, but his eyelids are already drooping, and he knows he’ll be asleep himself soon - real sleep this time. 

“M’kay...wake me up in like...three days.” He points a finger up drowsily at Shiro. “—nd you sleep too.”

The hand moves from his shoulder to push matted hair away from his forehead. “You got it.”

Lance nods once, definitively, and lets his hand drop back to his chest. “Good.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I'd love to hear what you think!


End file.
